


Lead Me Out of the Dark

by smokeandstarlight



Series: All That I've Got (Lead Me Out) [2]
Category: My Chemical Romance, frerard - Fandom
Genre: Highschool AU, M/M, Supernatural AU - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-05
Updated: 2014-01-12
Packaged: 2018-01-07 15:23:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 21,101
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1121456
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/smokeandstarlight/pseuds/smokeandstarlight
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Everything changes when Frank wakes up in a city he doesn't remember falling asleep in. His memories are gone, and he's left with nothing but the strangers that come to collect him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter One

**Author's Note:**

> Part Two!

Why does everything bad start with waking up somewhere that you don’t recall falling asleep in?

Far away, muffled as if through many walls, Frank could hear horns honking. Next, he registered tinny music, and the sound of a city so full of people it practically had its own heartbeat. 

That thought made Frank shake himself more fully awake. His eyes hurt to open, like they’d been shut for too long. Worse, his whole body ached, and it was curled up on itself. 

Frank saw why when he lifted his head. He was in the backseat of a car. 

In a second, Frank was sitting up, groaning at the pain licking its way up his body. Panic gripped his heart, pumping it twice as fast as it should go normally, and his head couldn’t process everything. 

He was in a Jeep. It had dark leather seats, but it was obviously used: the console was beat to shit, and the whole inside stunk like smoke. Was this his car?

Frank pushed the question aside, this couldn’t be his, or he’d remember it. He looked down at himself, hoping he wouldn’t find some open wound and a missing organ. 

Running his hands over his head, he noted what felt like a deep cut right at his hairline, but it wasn’t bleeding or anything. Nothing else looked damaged, however. 

He was endlessly glad to find he was wearing clothes, too. Jeans (holy crap he needed a new pair), black tennis shoes, and a Batman shirt that was full of holes. 

The biggest problem now had to be addressed. 

Slowly, Frank tried the door. It was unlocked, and it opened, letting cold air snake in. Frank hissed and wished he’d been smart enough to bring a jacket before passing out in someone’s car or whatever. 

He stepped outside, arms wrapped childishly around his torso. He dropped them when he took in where he was, his mouth and heart dropping too. 

The Jeep was the only car in an overgrown parking lot, and after it came crumbling buildings, and beyond that sterling skyscrapers pierced the horizon.

The city was absolutely gorgeous from Frank could see. The sky was a vibrant pink, like evening, and the fading sun shimmered off the glass and steel and beauty. He could smell fallen leaves- crisp yet damp- and car exhaust. 

“Holy shit,” Frank whispered. This was not where he lived. And then his heart spazzed a bit more when Frank realized he didn’t even know where exactly he did live. 

Whirling in a circle, Frank could feel his panic becoming tangible. Holy fuck, holy fuck, holy-. It hit him then. 

“I don’t remember anything,” Frank said to himself. The goosebumps on his arms rose even further. 

Had he been drugged?

But he knew immediately that wasn’t it.

He could remember his name. Frank. His age. 17. And he could name all fifty states if someone where to ask. But other than that, there was nothing.

It wasn’t even like he had a gaping hole in his mind, that he could feel the absence of his memories. No, instead, it just felt like he’d started back at square one, with every scrubbed and clean and whole. Just empty. 

Something was horrible wrong, and Frank had no idea how to remember what. He was stuck, freezing and alone in a sketchy parking lot in some buzzing city.

Should he leave? Where would he go? The police?

That sounded reasonable to Frank. They could identify him. Maybe he was missing? Frank still hadn’t ruled out being kidnapped then abandoned here. Maybe whoever had left him here was coming back, and this was Frank’s only chance to escape. 

Huddling his arms back around himself, Frank started a brisk pace across the lot. Wherever he was it must be the slums that leaked out of the heartbeat-city. Frank could hear the larger noises from the horizon, and closer he could hear the less pleasant sounds of trash scraping pavement, of voices peaking, and of the mufflers of shitty cars. 

Frank was just about to walk off the cracked lot, and onto the equally ugly sidewalk, when a car came rumbling to a stop at the curb in front of him. 

Oh, shit. Was this whoever had left him here?

Frank picked up his pace, shooting by the car’s bumper and across the street. When a man stepped out of the car and turned toward Frank, Frank began to run full-out. Praying to whatever god there was that this wasn’t really happening. 

“Wait!” he heard someone call. There were suddenly footsteps behind him, more than one set. And around the corner, another car pulled to a stop and more people emerged. 

Frank had not expected to have been kidnapped by a fucking group. But now that he knew that, he knew he couldn’t outrun them all. He’d have to out maneuver them and hope they weren’t as agile as himself. 

Frank darted between two peeling-paint houses, jumped a fence, and was across another street in a second. He ran another block and ended up in a rundown playground. It seemed Frank was out of luck because it was only a minute before he heard shouts behind him again.

They grew closer, and holy shit, they must be moving faster than humanly possible because suddenly, they were right behind him. And before Frank could run another step, he was being tackled. 

He landed face first on the pavement (fucking park didn’t even have wood chips or anything). Arms were around him, firm but not strangling, but they didn’t let him lift his head. 

More people gathered above them, talking and moving around, and Frank still couldn’t see any of them.

Then, a voice right near his ear. “Frank, we need you to not move. I’m going to have Natalie let you go, but please, don’t try to run.”

He didn’t speak. Eventually, they took that as agreement, and whoever was holding him down moved away. 

Frank wasn’t stupid. He wasn’t one of the types that would run when he knew he had no chance. He would stay and fight and he would get answers. 

He got his arms under him and spit on the pavement inches from his face. Then he stood and turned around to the voices. 

There were five people surrounding him, and suddenly Frank was even more glad he hadn’t attempted to bolt. 

They quieted as he set his glare on them. There were two females, and three males, and not a single one of them looked like the creepy kidnapper types. They looked utterly normal, and Frank could feel shock slacking his face. 

One of the males stepped forward, and Frank stepped back, trying his best to look intimidating. 

“Hey, Frank. I’m Chris,” the man gestured to himself, Frank just kept scowling. “This is Natalie, William, Aaronlyn, and Alex.”

Night was falling fast, the pink sinking away timidly and dark blue amassing in the sky. Still, Frank could make out the faces of the people the man pointed to. 

“No offense,” Frank spit out, “but I don’t care about introductions. I want to know how you know me, and why you left me in that parking lot.”

Though his nerves and his instincts told him to run, he needed answers. Without them, he had nothing. 

Chris nodded. He was so calm that it was having the opposite affect on Frank- it was pissing him off.

“We’re- we’re friends, Frank. And we weren’t the ones who left you there, we’re just the ones in charge of picking you up and making sure you’re safe,” Chris said. 

“That explained nothing,” Frank said bitterly. He was now moving backward slowly, giving up on answers, and resorting to ‘run’.

“Well, unfortunately, we aren’t allowed to explain yet.” 

This was one of the girls- Natalie. “Now, stop trying to back away or I’ll have to hold you down again, Frank.”

Just then, Frank realized that she’d been the one to tackle him. He knew the strength of the female gender (his mom had beaten it into him), but he was still shocked to find out that his gawky body had been tackled by this thin, tanned girl.

She laughed at his expression, and he quickly shut his mouth and glowered again. They were seeming less and less dangerous by the second. 

“You need to come with us, though,” Natalie continued, gesturing toward the encroaching darkness, “or I guess you could stay and freeze your butt off in your Jeep.”

“My Jeep?” Frank stuttered out. 

“Well technically, it’s Chris’s, since he has the keys. But we were specifically told that it stays with you,” she finished. 

Frank switched his gaze to Chris. “Give them to me,” he said, trying for fierce and ending up as pleading. 

Chris shook his head, mouth pushed into a line. “Can’t,” he said. “But I’ll make you a deal, Frank. If you come with us tonight, and you give us a chance, you can have the keys and your Jeep back.” 

Narrowing his eyes, Frank mirrored Chris’s pinched mouth look for a moment. “And I won’t end up dead in a suitcase, if I come?”

Chris looked shocked by the words. “No- God, no-”

That kind of convinced Frank that they really weren’t kidnappers or whatever. Kidnappers didn’t look that confused and typically didn’t look like middle-aged business men and teenage kids. 

“Okay, I’ll come with you.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One part may not be italicized, so please ignore that! Gee does show up, but it's later!

They loaded him into a glossy Infinity, and the night air slipped in comfortingly as Frank closed the door. 

The other girl, Aaronlyn, sat next to him. Chris drove, and next to him was one of the other males. Frank was told Natalie was driving his Jeep to the ‘safehouse’ (or whatever the fuck they’d called), too. 

Throughout the drive, Frank was practically glued to the window as they got nearer to the city on the horizon. He had to squint to see everything because the glass was all tinted and the sky was dark. 

“We’re in Chicago,” a smooth voice said. 

Frank turned. It was Aaronlyn who’d spoken. She didn’t look back at him, but instead she was leaning over to see out of Frank’s window too. She had dark skin and her hair was in dreadlocks, clinking with beads. 

“Chicago. . .?” Frank said dumbly. 

“Oh, have you forgotten that too?” She turned her gaze on him. “It’s a city in Illinois, nicknamed the-”

“‘Windy City’,” Frank finished. “I haven’t forgotten that kind of stuff,” Frank shot her a look, “I just have no idea how I ended up here. Do I live here?” 

Aaronlyn pushed her hair away from her face and turned back to her own window.

“No,” she said simply. 

“Where do I live, then?” Frank implored. 

“If you decide to stay, then you’ll live here- in Chicago,” Aaronlyn said. “This city was the one thing in the world I couldn’t pass up.” As she spoke, she rolled down both of their windows, and Frank saw they were now in the city, buildings shiny and towering. 

He craned his head out the window and searched for where the stars hit the building peaks, and he could understand where she was coming from. It was beautiful here, and the air whooshed into Frank’s lungs, filling his body with city and sky and longing. He wasn’t scared to be in this car full of strangers just then.

In fact, he actually trusted them. 

They slowed, and the Hancock building passed the car in all its glory- lights all ablaze and people milling about its base. 

After that they took a few more turns, winding past delicate parks and down stretches of shops. Then, they pulled into a parking garage, and everyone burst into motion. 

Aaronlyn instructed Frank to stand by her as Chris did a head count and Natalie parked the Jeep. Then she put a hand between his shoulder blades and they followed behind the others into an apartment complex. 

The inside was ornate and brightly lit with lush carpet and wallpaper, and it was only a hallway. 

They went up in the mirror-lined elevator to the twelfth floor. 

Then the group trooped, muttering amongst themselves, to apartment 12C. 

Frank’s mouth dropped immediately as he stepped in. 

They stood in an entrance alcove, and beyond it was a massive room, with sleek hardwood floors, and the far wall completely taken up by floor-length windows. He could see wrought iron balconies beyond them. 

To their left a hallway branched off from the room, and some of the doors down it revealed other rooms. On their other side there was an archway that led to a stainless-steel kitchen, where a breakfast nook nestled by another giant window. 

“Woah,” Frank breathed. 

“Yeah, it looks nice, but you should see the monthly rent for this thing,” Chris said before shucking off his jacket and moving into the apartment. The others followed, kicking off shoes, completely comfortable here. Unlike Frank. 

“Anyways, welcome to our home,” Chris said. 

“Wait, all of you live here?” Frank asked. He had refused to take off his tennis shoes (or anything else for that matter)

“Yes,” Chris answered. Everyone was dispersing throughout the house, going into the kitchen or down the hallway. “We’ll answer your questions later, Frank. For now, you should get something to eat. And if you choose to stay, you can sleep in Alex’s room.”

A head poked out of the kitchen. “I heard my name,” a kid said. He was a few years older than Frank, and had dyed pink hair (how had Frank missed that ?). 

“Can Frank stay in your room, Alex?” Chris asked him then. 

“Yeah, sure,” Alex responded, then took a hunking bite out of the sandwich he held. 

Chris sighed and turned back to Frank. “Okay, why don’t you follow Alex, and he’ll get you dinner. Do you trust us enough to stay here, Frank?”

The weird thing was that he did. The moment he’d first laid eyes on them he knew deep in stomach that he was going to go with them, that he was going trust them. They were the only choice, and they seemed to know more about Frank than he did himself. 

Frank just nodded, and with that motion all thoughts of ditching this place and sleeping in his car vanished. 

Natalie went with him to the kitchen, and sat on a bar stool by him. Alex babbled to her as he made two more sandwiches. Frank flinched for some reason when Alex put a huge stack of ham on the bread slices, but when it was placed in front of him, he ate it readily. 

He hadn’t really registered how hungry he was, seeing as he’d been side-tracked by waking up in a car and then being taken in by people he’d never met before.

“So, Frank, you really don’t remember anything?” Alex asked suddenly, leaning casually on the counter from Frank. 

Natalie whacked him, but didn’t try to stop Frank from answering. 

“I remember- I remember facts, I guess. Like I know how to drive, and how to solve math problems in my head. But I can’t remember anything personal- any real memories from. . . before,” Frank answered after some thought. 

Natalie looked at him empathically, and Alex kind of looked down. “Sorry, man. I can’t imagine,” he said. 

Frank took a bite out of his sandwich, hoping to force the knot in his throat down. “It’s not all that bad, I guess. I just wish I had an idea why it happened,” Frank said when he could speak normally. 

Natalie thought for a moment, glossy hair hiding her face before she turned to Frank. “There are answers out there, you know. Nothing ever happens without leaving a mark.”

_Nothing ever happens without leaving a mark_ . Somewhere in this world, there was a Frank sized marked, a giant disaster, and Frank needed to find it. 

“You’re saying I could find out what happened?” Frank looked into her eyes, searching. 

She looked back, then nodded. “But you should wait, maybe you’ll remember after a while. I just know that Chris knows a lot of the answers, but he won’t be able to tell you.”

Alex had gone quiet, but he was watching them intently. He had made no move to stop Natalie from letting Frank in on things Frank obviously wasn’t supposed to know. 

“Why are you telling me this?” Frank asked. 

“Because no one should be left in the dark,” Natalie answered fiercely, before she jumped down from the stool and left the room. 

“That girl,” Alex said with an unreadable expression. “Anyways, let’s go to bed.”

He let Frank stuff the last bite of his sandwich in his mouth, then dragged him out of the kitchen. 

-

Alex offered Frank pajamas, and Frank took the pants, but insisted on keeping his holey Batman shirt on. It comforted him. 

He spent a while in the bathroom, showering and thinking. 

When he finally got a chance to look in the mirror, he was shocked. He knew what he looked like, but the Frank in the mirror was too tired looking, too thin, and too lost. 

Also, this new Frank had a massive healing wound on his forehead. On closer inspection, Frank noted that it was about 2 and a half inches long, and that it had been stitched up. It was a few days old at the most, and probably should’ve been in a bandage. 

“Fuck me,” Frank groaned. 

“Sorry, kid, I’m straight,” came a reply from outside the bathroom door, and Frank opened it to scowl at Alex. 

“Shut it,” he said, “and then look at this thing on my head.”

Alex came into the bathroom, and looked at the displayed cut in the steam-fogged mirror. 

“Oh, ew!” He squealed, “I thought I saw that, but ew!”

Frank had to stop himself from stomping on the guy’s foot. Instead, he pushed his hair over the cut, and went back into Alex’s room. 

“So what do you think happened there?” Alex asked a moment later. 

Frank slumped down on the second bed in Alex’s messy room. “Once again, I have no idea. Maybe it’s the reason I can’t remember anything?”

Alex plopped down on his own bed, mussing up his pink hair and pushing dirty clothes off the bedsheets. “I think it’s only in movies where a bump on the head makes you forget things.”

Frank could hear the smile in Alex’s voice, and he laughed a bit himself. Something about Alex put Frank at ease, made him feel less like he didn’t belong in this fancy apartment in Chicago. Made him feel normal. 

Alex fell asleep with his butt in the air a few minutes later, and though it wasn’t even that late, Frank found himself following suit. He really fucking wished he wake up to a semblance of a normal life. . . 

-

Someone poked Alex awake around two in the morning. It was Chris. Alex could make out him putting a finger to his lips in the dark. Then Chris motioned for Alex to follow him out of the room. 

They passed sleeping Frank. Alex had no idea how the kid could be so passed out, seeing as he’d been asleep in that car for half a day before they’d gotten to him. But Alex guessed maybe shock could exhaust people. 

Out in the polished ivory hallway, the warm light illuminated the bags under Chris’s eyes. 

“Have you even been to bed, Chris?” Alex asked, concern coloring his voice. 

Chris ran a hand down his face, scrubbing at the stubble across his jaw- a movement Alex had become very familiar with in the last few years. 

“No,” Chris said finally, “but don’t worry about me, Alex. Listen, I have a request.”

His eyes met Alex’s, and Alex nodded. He’d do anything to help Chris, who’d saved his ass countless times. Chris continued. 

“I need you to make Frank stay. Use your ability, and make him want to be here. His friends went to a great deal getting him safely here, and the only way I know how to protect him is to have him here.” Chris motioned at the apartment around them. 

Alex didn’t even have to think before he agreed. Everything in him knew Frank needed to stay here, where he was safe. Everything in him knew that Frank was something new, something worth protecting. 

Chris looked relieved, and he hugged Alex for a moment before telling him to go back to bed. 

“I will if you will,” Alex replied. 

Chris smiled and nodded. “Okay, deal. Thanks.”

Alex shuffled back into the shadowy room, pausing a moment beside Frank, then he continued to his own bed and was out in minutes. 

\--

 

_He was driving the Jeep. The road was black, and the air slunk in the open windows like tar. Fear pounded in ever inch of Frank’s body, and his hands gripped the steering wheel so hard that there was no blood in his fingers. Something was after him, and as he hurtled down the narrowing road, they were catching up._

Suddenly, someone put their hand on Frank’s knee. Calm eased in through his veins, and Frank glanced over thankfully. But for some reason he couldn’t see the face of the person that the hand belonged to. 

He needed to. He had to see, but the person was inky, and mixing with the shadows- long hair swooping to hide their face. 

A flash of pale skin, then Frank’s car was out of control; dark eyes, and the hand was off his knee. Another second and the bones of Frank’s knuckled burst through the skin of his fingers, blood seeping and someone was crying. Then the car hit something and the world went black. 

“Something’s wrong with him.”

“Hold him still.”

“Should we call them?”

“He’s waking up!” 

The last voice was Natalie’s. Frank jerked into consciousness. It felt like hitting a brick wall face first. His eyes shuttered open, and he took in the group amassed around his bed. That brought him to reality completely, and his brain was filled with an information stream of the night before. 

“What’s going on?” Frank asked suspiciously, sitting up and backing against the headboard- as if that would help him escape an attack. 

And an attack was exactly what Frank’s brain was warning him about. Chris, Alex, Natalie, and the other guy from last night were standing around his bed, watching him with curious looks. 

“You started freaking out,” Alex said. He looked disheveled, and Frank couldn’t tell if that was just his look or not. “It was a night terror or something.”

Running a hand through his hair, Frank registered that his heart was in fact running itself against his ribcage, and he was sweating lightly. 

“Why are you all here then?” Frank had read about night terrors, and he didn’t think they required an entourage of strangers watching him. 

“You became unconsolable, and we couldn’t get you to wake up,” Chris answered for him. He had a concerned expression, and Frank could make out lines from where Chris had made that face many times before. 

“I’m- I’m fine,” Frank stuttered, feeling exposed, a thin sheet the only thing between the onlookers’ gaze and Frank’s boxers and pale legs. “It was a nightmare.” Frank wanted to cringe at the memory of it, but he shoved the urge aside. 

No one moved, Chris’s lines deepening. 

Then, from somewhere in the apartment a baby started crying, and the world unfroze. 

“I better go help,” the man next to Chris said. He was one of the guys from last night- young, with a wide jaw and chin length hair. He had an elfish look, with slanted eyes and a pretty bone structure. 

“I’ll come, too, William,” Chris said, then he shot Frank another over-worried look and hurried out behind William. 

Frank turned to Alex and Natalie, who’d stayed. “Since when did you guys have a fucking baby?” he sputtered. 

Natalie cracked a smile and sat at the foot of Frank’s bed. Alex remained upright, looking kind of shaken, but he gave a weak grin. 

“Not _our_ baby,” Natalie said, crossing her legs. “She’s Aaronlyn’s.”

Frank had been wondering where Aaronlyn had gone last night. He’d only just met her, but it seemed fitting that she’d be a mother, with her calm tone and thoughtfulness. 

Suddenly, Frank’s heart seized on the word ‘mother’. 

He had a mother out there. Someone who’d loved him and raised him, and now had been torn away from him. Fuck, he missed the idea of his mom so bad he wanted to scream. 

Though, when the other two looked at him oddly, he hitched his breath in a few times and managed to push the thought aside.

At least for a minute. 

“Huh. It’s still weird. This whole place is weird. Like Chris obviously isn’t your father, either of yours, and- fuck- Alex, you’re like nineteen. . .”

Alex’s face pinched up a bit at the words, and though Frank was pretty sure not a lot of things must make him uncomfortable, this was one of those things. 

The air had turned sluggish, taut with tension, and Frank knew there were secrets in its midst- in the silence. 

Finally, Alex spoke, “He’s not related to us. No one in the apartment is related to each other, save for Aaronlyn and Ana, the baby.”

Frank kept his mouth shut, hoping to get more information, but neither of them offered any up. Eventually, Natalie hopped up. 

“You should get dressed. Chris will want to talk to you about school and clothing and other things you will need,” she flounced around Alex’s chaotic room as she spoke, gathering clothing items. 

She flung them at Frank when she stopped moving, and Alex made a protesting noise. “Hey that’s my stuff!”

Natalie shot him a glare, “The kid has no memories, and now you’re going to deny him clothing?” she said fiercely, and when she set her hands on her hips, Frank had to stifle a laugh. 

Alex cracked a smile, “I was kidding, of course I wouldn’t. He can even have my pink belt.”

For some reason that tempted Frank, and when he told them that they cracked up and Alex offered it up. 

“You might need it if you’re going to wear my jeans. I swear, you are the smallest person I’ve ever seen.” Alex moved so Frank could maneuver past him toward the bathroom, hands full of clothing. 

Right before Frank shut the bathroom door, he winked over his shoulder. “Trust me, not all of me’s small.”

He smiled when he heard Alex yelp and yell “I’m straight!” again. 

The jeans didn’t fit, as Alex had predicted. They sagged and the fabric of the legs bunched up around Frank’s feet where they were too long. He felt like a little kid wearing his dad’s clothes, playing grown-up. 

Ouch. 

Natalie had also thrown a gray t-shirt with a british flag on it, but unsurprisingly, Frank couldn’t make himself change out of the Batman shirt. He was glad to find she’d also thrown him a red zipper-hoodie, though. 

When Frank emerged, he was a whirlwind of clashing colors and mixed fabrics, the pink belt just topping the outfit off. 

Both Alex and Natalie had to clamp hands over their mouths to keep from laughing when they saw him. Frank scowled at first, but soon he was joining them. There was something about them that made him feel good, and he wasn’t going to question it or ruin anything. 

But then suddenly something Natalie had said hit him. “Wait- what the fuck- school ?!”

Natalie gave him a ‘duh’ look, one that contorted her pretty face comically. 

“Yeah, school,” she spelled out. “You’re only seventeen. Normal seventeen-year olds go to school.”

Frank was sort of frozen with indecision. “But, I haven’t even said I was going to stay. . . and now everyone expects me to go to school?”

Alex messed with one of the strings of Frank’s hoodie. “You don’t exactly have anywhere else to go. And I know this is probably the weirdest setting you’ve ever been in, but you should stay.”

Alex looked up at Frank with large eyes, and Frank decided suddenly that he would stay. He liked it here. And Alex was right, he had no where to go- no one who missed him or knew him in this entire city. 

“Okay,” the words were quiet, but grins broke out on Alex’s and Natalie’s faces. 

“Chris will be glad to hear,” Natalie jumped over to Frank and tugged on his hand, trying to herd him to the door. 

Frank let her, and they ended up in the apartment’s main room. 

“I’ll go get him from his office,” Alex said. Natalie forced Frank to sit on the large couch in the center of the room, then bounced her way off into the kitchen. 

She came back with a Toaster Strudel and a glass of juice, and sat by Frank. “Oh, no fair!” Frank said, giving voice to the demands his stomach had been making for the last twenty minutes. “I want one!”

Natalie laughed and extended her half-eaten one toward Frank. “Here you go, Frankie.”

Frank narrowed his eyes, but right as she went to pull it back from under his nose, he grabbed it and took out a large hunk. Natalie cracked up, the wiggled around on the couch in protest when Frank attempted to give the mutilated breakfast food back to her. 

“Yeah, they made quick friends,” Alex said from the hallway. Natalie and Frank’s head shot up to find Chris and Alex walking toward the couch. 

“That’s good,” Chris replied, then he stood in front of where they sat. “So Frank, I have some things to talk to you about. First off, we’ll need to get you your own clothes.”

Frank heard Alex laugh and whacked his arm a bit. 

“What?” Alex laughed, “Even you have to realize that you can’t wear that horrible Batman shirt forever.”

Frank crossed his arms across his chest protectively, then stuck his tongue out in Alex’s direction. 

“Okay, stop it you two,” Chris interrupted, full parent-mode on or something. “Frank, new clothes. Natalie and Alex can take you shopping. In the next couple of days, I’ll get you registered at Alex’s school. Does all that sound okay?”

Frank nodded. But then questions bloomed in his mind. “You said you’d explain things to me last night. Like where I’m from?” Frank couldn’t keep the hope out of his voice.

Everyone looked pained for a second. 

Then Chris cleared his throat. “I’m sorry, Frank, but we really don’t know anything about you.”

Frank stood up fast. “But- but you have to know! You knew where I was, you knew my name. I know there are people out there that must be looking for me!”

Chris’s face took on it lined appearance again. But he looked set on his decision to not tell Frank what he wanted, though he had promised. 

“They’re not looking for you, Frank. As I said before, they’re the ones who left you here,” Chris said quietly, the words punching Frank with each syllable. Chris turned away, looking as if the words had hurt him too, and he went back down the hallway. 

_It’s the truth_ , Frank thought, _they left me here, why would they want me back?_

Natalie cooed a bit and she brought Frank’s hand into her lap, and scooted closer to him. Alex sat on his other side. 

“Frank. . .” Natalie muttered, sympathy in her tone. 

Frank jerked his head, and gripped her hand tighter. “You said that there were answers. Will you help me find them, soon?” 

Natalie hesitated, then nodded, dark eyes looking into Frank’s. “I’ll help you. But it’ll take awhile, okay?”

Frank agreed. He needed to know, and as long as he was making progress, he could wait. 

“Now let’s get you your own damn Toaster Strudel,” she said, and still holding his hand, she lead the way to the kitchen.  
-

Aaronlyn was by the sink, cleaning dishes. Beside her, William was holding a small toddler, with dark skin and bright eyes. She was eating cheerios out of William’s hand and looking completely content. 

Both of the adults greeted Frank, Natalie, and Alex who’d followed them (only for the food, he’d insisted).

In the breakfast nook, Frank was surprised to see another kid. A girl, who looked about four, with short blonde hair. She was focused on getting a too-full spoon of Captain Crunch into her mouth, but when she saw Frank she stopped. 

“Hey,” Frank said timidly when the girl wouldn’t look away from him. 

“Hi,” she said finally, little-kid voice all high with shyness. 

Frank wasn’t used to kids, he knew that much for sure. Still he kind of stepped closer to the girl while Natalie busied herself with making food.

“What’s your name?” Frank asked after a moment. 

“Lucie,” she answered, pride written across her features. 

“I’m Frank,” he said, and she smiled at him, showing tiny, kid teeth. Milk was dripping down her chin, and Frank grinned back. 

“Lucie, why don’t you tell Frank how much you like his belt,” Alex nudged in. He sat across from the girl. 

Lucie’s eyes got wide when Frank lifted his hoodie to show her the pink of the belt.

“Oh,” she squealed, “It’s like the one Alex has, and it’s pink!” 

Frank laughed and went to sit by Alex. Natalie brought over Frank’s own Toaster Strudel, and his own icing to match. Frank garffed it down, listening to Lucie babble to Natalie.

Alex was busy with his own pastry, but that didn’t stop him from trying to drink the juice Natalie had given Frank. 

Frank was fine with sharing, but Natalie would smack Alex’s hand away each time he reached for the glass. 

The meal ended when she knocked his hand a bit too hard, and it smashed into the cup, and orange juice ended up all over the food and in Lucie’s cereal (she ate it anyways). 

Aaronlyn chided them, then went to open the kitchen window and let the city noises into the room. 

Cool autumn air wafted in, too, and Frank couldn’t keep the feeling of (happiness?) from bubbling up as he helped clean up the sticky mess. 

-

The next day, Natalie and Alex took Frank shopping. They both insisted the Batman shirt had to go, but Frank managed to strike a deal where he’d get to keep it if he bought some other clothes. 

They took him to a few of the upper-level tourist shops, like Brooks Brothers and Polo. They dragged him down street by street, and Frank had fun darting across teeming streets, and feeling the city on his skin. 

He managed to convince them to take him out to the Marilyn Monroe statue, and then to an old bridge and then back across town for lunch. 

Natalie finally gave him a stern look, and Frank had to actually shop. He left the Macy’s at the end of the day with new t-shirts, boxers, jeans, and socks. Alex let him keep the pink belt, though. 

\--

 

For a few days, they all just stayed in. No one left, not even Chris. Frank had no idea how any of them were making money, but he let it go. 

He ended up playing board games with Lucie, and sitting on the balcony with Natalie, who’d tell him about the places in the city. Alex would join them, and he’d tell Frank about Boston, where he was from originally. 

One day, he offered to dye Frank’s hair pink too, but Frank insisted the belt was enough (that made Lucie upset, so he had to play an extra log game of Chutes & Ladders with her). 

Frank learned he’d missed his birthday, which was Halloween, when he was in transition- or whatever the fuck you call losing seventeen years of your life.

Natalie and Alex threw him a spooky-themed party, and his cake had eighteen little spider candles on it. 

Chris finally emerged from his office near the end of the week, and informed Frank that he was registered at the public school Alex attended. 

Frank had whirled on Alex then. “You go to high school? You’re nineteen, though!? Why’ve you been home all week?” Frank couldn’t keep his voice from going all high and embarrassing. 

Alex made a sheepish face, and scrubbed his crazy pink hair. “Yeah, I got held back a few years ago. . . I was in the midst of moving here.” He looked pained, and Frank wanted to take back his words. 

“But, about this week,” Alex continued, “Chris said I could stay and help you get- what was the word?” He turned to Chris. 

“Acclimated,” Chris sighed endearingly. Before he turned to leave, he gave both of them a stern look. “You’ll both be going to school Monday morning, so be ready.”


	3. Chapter Three

Fate works it mysterious ways. But that’s the thing. _It works_.

Frank had been in Chicago for a month now. Slowly, the phantom that was his old life had faded away. A ghost, but by no means gone. Still, he felt good here. He liked school with Alex, even though he had to wear a scratchy polo for uniform.

The first day at school, Frank’s stomach had filled with jostling birds (they were too distracting to be butterflies), but he’d survived. Alex had made sure that Frank met his friends too, and Frank found himself fitting in with the vulgar but funny group immediately.

Now each day after the final bell, Frank and Alex would make their way to the 7-11 just outside the city. Alex would buy Frank cigarettes, a habit Frank had discovered he’d had, much to Chris’s distaste. Then they’d suck down slurpees, or when they were too wrapped up in jackets and scarfs to want anything cold, they’d buy hot coffee instead.

When they finished in the gas station, they’d usually drive down the streets of the suburbs, windows cracked to the freezing air and The Lawrence Arms blasting.

\--

Very slowly, over the weeks, Frank finally got the answers Natalie had promised him. Not all of them, but enough for the time being. Frank learned of the organization called The Jury. How they hunt down Individuals, the name for people like Natalie and Chris and the rest of them.

Chris explained that being an Individual meant you possessed abilities. And apparently that meant everyone in the house but Frank and the baby had some power or whatever the fuck. Chris could sense other Individuals, Natalie had super-strength, Alex had a calming ability, Aaronlyn could sense thought directions, William could predict events, and even freaking Lucie could move water. Frank felt left out as shit. But Alex and Natalie worked to make him feel better, and eventually he did.

His life became this weird mismatched quilt of normal school days, normal relationships, but not-so normal people. And he liked it.

\--

Things started to get weird about halfway through December, though. Instead of holiday spirit and excitement for winter break, the house was becoming a dunk tank of tension. Frank would walk in from the frozen, snow-frosted world and the apartment’s atmosphere would hit him the face- too many thoughts and secrets kept behind sealed lips. It made the whole beautiful place seem dim.

Some days, Frank would hear Chris talking on the phone through all hours of the night. He couldn’t make out the words in the dark, half-sleep mode he was in, but he could tell Chris’s tone was strained.

It happened the day school was let out for break.

Frank came home to secrets in Natalie’s eyes. She hustled Frank away from Alex as soon as the stepped into the entranceway, and didn’t stop until they both ended up in her room. Frank unwound his patterned scarf and wiggled from his jacket, then plopped down on her neatly made bed.

“Natalie, what’s going on?” He watched her bounce around the room, half-words falling from her mouth, and a stricken face to match. “Calm down, and tell me!” Frank said, exasperated.

She turned and came close to Frank. “Chris left for business, Frank.”

Frank just looked up at her, expression blank. “Yeah?”

“His office is unlocked. All of the rest of your answers are sitting in there, Frankie.”

 _Holy shit_ , Frank thought, _she was right._

Jumping up, Frank started for the door, heart crashing like a tidal wave on his ribcage. “Let’s go, we need to go and see, c’mon-” Frank was about to open the door when suddenly Natalie wrapped her arms around his waist from behind, trying to stop him, and he went flying back from the doorway. He ended up on his butt on the floor, a heap of clothes and wide open eyes.

“What the fuck, Natalie?” Frank finally choked out.

Natalie still stood by the door, looking down at Frank in shock. She looked close to tears. “Oh, Frank, I’m so sorry, I- I didn’t mean to.” Frank shifted to his feet, and kind of brushed off his jeans, as if he could dust away the bruises he could feel blooming.

He sighed. “It’s okay. You don’t know your own strength, or whatever the fuck those idiots say these days.” Frank gave Natalie a pointed look that shouted ‘keep your ability under control'.

Natalie still looked like she might start sobbing, but Frank took her hand and tugged her until she said on her bed. “It’s really alright. But you obviously had something you needed to tell me,” Frank said pointedly.

Her face cleared a bit. “Yeah, I do. You can’t just go marching in there. Aaronlyn or someone will stop you. Even Alex would try to keep you from going in. You need to wait until they’re asleep,” she said.

“That makes sense,” Frank admitted, gathering up his winter clothes that he’d discarded. He looked back at Natalie. “Okay, I’ll probably need your help to access everything that you believe is in there. So will you come with me tonight?”

Natalie stood up and smiled, white teeth stark against her tan skin. “This is cute.” She snuck the scarf from Frank’s hands and wrapped it around his neck, letting her fingers linger there. “Extra cute now. And of course I will,” she said, then turned away.

Frank walked out of the room with his mind too full to even think about how he felt about that whole encounter.

\--

Every step he made echoed in the apartment. It was close to one in the morning, and Frank had just managed to whisper past sleeping Alex, and into the hall.

The ornate lights on each side of him lit the way. They were fashioned to look like old candle-lanterns, and they gave the house a tasteful ode to past styles. Frank crept onwards, shaking thoughts about the lighting from his mind.His feet stuck to the glossy hardwood as he walked, and it made him flinch each time he unsuctioned his skin from the floor to take a step.

Natalie appeared from her room a few doors down a moment later, dressed in what she’d had on during the day. Frank flushed remembering he was wearing his plaid pj pants and favorite Batman shirt, but the embarrassment washed away when he remembered he had bigger things going on. Natalie grabbed Frank’s hand just then, and started tiptoe- running downing the hall toward the office, prancing like a deranged antelope.

Frank was dragged mercilessly along behind her. He waited until the office’s door was closed before scowling at her. “I was doing fine without your deer-dance or whatever that was!”

Natalie laughed. “You would’ve taken until the sun woke everyone up, you mean.”

Frank stuck out his tongue, then turned in a circle to take in the office. It was a dark wood color, with leather-bound books on the selves (how could one person even read all those?!) and the focal point was a great desk. On the desk was a giant 27 inch Mac.

That was when it stopped being a fancy study, however.

Every flat surface was occupied by scattered papers, bills and unopened mail. Among the mess Frank could spot overturned coffee cups and food wrappers. By the window, Frank found a box stuffed with CDs, crusted socks, magazines, what looked like half a ball of yarn.

“He really managed to shit up a nice office,” Frank said casually.

“Yeah. That’s something you don’t expect about Chris: he’s an absolute pack-rat. And slob, don’t forget the slob part,” Natalie said, shoving clean a space around the computer and sitting down in the desk chair.

Frank joined her and watched over her shoulder as she turned on the computer. “You know how to get into it?” Frank asked.

Natalie nodded. “His passwords are always simple. They’ve been the same, like, four things since I was three. Also, he’s never had to have a reason to worry about his stuff being looked through.”

Frank bent over and set his chin on the back of the chair. “Until now.”

“Until now,” she just agreed. She went quiet as she tried typing two different passwords into the locked computer screen. Both times, the icon just flashed ‘incorrect’ and nothing changed.

Finally, Natalie typed in something and the icon went away, the screen opening onto a blank homescreen. “What’d you even put in?” Frank asked, itching to get his hands on the computer himself.

“His favorite food,” Natalie motioned at the mess surrounding them. Frank looked closer, and suddenly he could pick out bag upon empty, yellow bag among the paper.

“No way, Swedish Fish? For real?” Frank laughed, grinning from ear to ear. Natalie shoved one of the bags away from herself and stood up, smiling back at Frank.

“Yep. Now sit down. You have answers to find.”

“Okay. Let’s get at it.” Frank turned to the computer, and Natalie reached over his shoulder for the mouse. She clicked at different folders on the screen until she finally clicked opened an unnamed program.

The moment it opened they both knew this was it. The program was organized with tabs labeled by state, and had a search box at the top. The middle was a running stream of information, things Frank couldn’t fathom understanding. It was obviously a database. <i> This was it. This was the truth. </i>

“Search your name,” Natalie said from behind him. Frank’s hands shook and he began to type. ‘Frank Iero’ He clicked enter.

The screen began to fill. Natalie leaned in closer as article after article appeared. Frank could see his own name bolded in their titles, or under them in the article summaries.

He felt like he was going to faint. His head felt brainless, his body weightless and his mouth desert dry. When the screen was done locating all the things ever tagged with Frank’s name, Frank actually started reading the results. Since he didn’t know exactly where to start, Frank just clicked open the first link and began to read.

 ** _Jury Headquarters, New York City, Destroyed_**.

_Saturday, October 27th, a rescue mission staged by Brian Schechter of Newark, New Jersey, caused the demolition of The Jury Headquarters of New York_

 

_The rescue mission was issued for seventeen year old Gerard Way, kidnapped the morning of October 17th. The mission was approved upon after correspondence from the majority of safehouses on the East Coast. See_ ** _Rescue: NJ05_ ** _for information on the decision._

_The_ Unified Individual Investigation Committee _report that the mission was successful. However, the flaws in the initial plan resulted in the hazardous fires ignited in the HQ, and the Jury members being alerted of Individual presence. The UIIC have concluded that all damage and attention was unavoidable, and no one involved in the mission will be charged with Reckless Endangerment of Kin._

_However, one of those rescued from the headquarters was a 17 year-old human,_ ** _Frank Iero_ ** _of Newark, NJ. (Update: As of this time Iero’s mother has been identified as a Jury member. She is highly wanted and dangerous. Please_ ** _contact Unified Individuals Protection Line i_ ** _f you have information on this suspect)._

_Iero was later claimed by Schechter, as well as Gerard Way. Now, Iero is in critical care, having sustained serious injuries during the rescue._

_As a whole, the Unified American Individuals are still debating of what should be done with a young human with knowledge of Abilities and with a direct connection to the Jury. They are also investigating Iero’s past to see if he was in league with his mother._

_The rescued Individual, Gerard Way, was reported to have told to UAI that "[Iero] is not of any danger, and was just a causality to the knowledge he possesses." Way, who is unharmed, was also reunited to his brother, Mikey, who as seen here, was kidnapped three months prior._

_Furthermore, New Jersey Individuals are being urged to evacuate- as well as much of the East Coast safehouses. There is a high-level threat of Jury retaliation, for the destruction of one of their bases will be seen as a direct attack. To all other safehouses, take in refugees and remember that under the radar is better than under the knife._

_\--29 October_

 

The page was filled with links to other articles on people and events, but Frank couldn’t think.

His mother was a member of the Jury. Someone who hurt people like Natalie and Alex and Chris-- Hurt people like himself it seemed, since the article had said he’d sustained serious injuries.

Frank reached up to his forehead and felt his now- scar. Something must have hit him there, hard enough to rattle his bones. Hard enough to land him in the ICU of a hospital.

The next fact hit Frank then. He was from New Jersey. He’d lived thousands of miles away. Had he lived with this Brian guy? Had his mother loved Frank at all, or had she given him up to the Jury? Was Frank part of the Jury himself?!

Frank dropped his head into his hands on the desk, brain pulsing and red-flagging- and _holy shit a building had caught fire_ , and _he had been in it,_ he’d been part of it.

Natalie remained silent, but she rubbed Frank’s back soothingly. Finally, Frank’s curiosity won the fight between his overflowing mind, and he had to get back to reading. He went back to the previous page and clicked open the second article.

**_Verdict Reached On Seventeen Year Old Frank Iero_ **

 

The Unified American Individuals _have decided that, with no evidence of interactions between the young Iero and the Jury, that the boy will not be charged or detained for any reason. The UAI have, however, deemed Iero unpredictable, and a liability. The boy has also been identified as a Jury target because of his mother’s abandonment of her position at the New York Jury HQ._

_The Councilman of the UAI has released this statement: “Frank Iero . . . will be relocated, as specified by the Unified Individuals. . . Seeing as Iero is still underage, and has no guardian, he will be moved to a safehouse. The safehouse will be in an area without prominent Jury activity and with trustworthy Individuals. His previous friends and family have agreed to have Iero removed from the danger that obviously lies on the East Coast. We assure you that all other issues regarding Iero and his mother will be solved in a quick and orderly manner. Thank you”_

_The UAI reportedly have dealt with Iero’s records and other public documents. He will be relocated from the hospital tomorrow. All who encounter the young Iero in the future are urged to not mention any Individual related material._

_\-- 31 October_

It wasn’t the Jury that left him here, then. It was the Individuals. It was his friends and whoever they thought counted as his family, if his mom was a wanted criminal.Frank didn’t know how to feel. The words ‘liability’ and ‘human’ didn’t sit well with him.

“They’re talking about me as if I’m nothing. Like I’m a chess piece they can move around the country, then forget about,” Frank muttered to himself.

“I’m sorry Frank,” Natalie said from where she’d been reading over his shoulder. “It’s big network of people, and not all of them will be as open-minded about a human as involved as you were. They’re not all like us.”

Frank nodded. It was true. He couldn’t expect the whole world to side with him, to not see him as a danger to their secrets. But it still made him fucking mad that these people had decided his fate. They’d taken him away from his old life, dropped him here so that the Jury wouldn’t target him. It was like a freaky superhero Witness Protection Program. Only way more extreme.

“I still don’t know why I can’t remember anything, though” Frank finally said.

Natalie made a noise. “Yeah, I asked Chris about that, too. He really doesn’t know why you can’t remember anything, and I believe him.”

“Huh.” Frank said, then he got side-tracked by clicking the link about his mom leaving the Jury.

It opened to a picture of a middle-aged, dark haired woman. It had been taken in a deteriorating kitchen, and from her expression it seemed as if she hadn’t been prepared for the camera flash. Still, she didn’t look like a criminal- didn’t look like someone who’d let her son get involved in this mess. Frank read.

_**Debra Iero,** 51 years old, is a suspect in the kidnapping of Gerard Way. Investigations of the Iero home have revealed that Debra had been keeping records of the seventeen year old, including computer searches and correspondence about the boy’s history. She is assumed to have been a scouter, or one who seeks out Individuals, for the New York Jury. This association makes her a wanted criminal. She has been on the run since a week before the rescue mission for Way. The Unified Individual Investigation Committee have issued a warrant for her: please contact them _ ** _here_ ** _if you have any information._

**_UPDATE_ ** _: It has been released that Iero, 51 year old Jury Scouter, had attempted to cover up Way’s existence, a direct violation to her position as a Jury member. Investigators still do not know why she may have done this, or what made her finally give up the boy to the HQ. Information will be released as it is uncovered._

_\--October 31_

 

Frank was even more confused than before.The articles were written like the normal news, but they were full of weird details and links and Frank’s fucking mother.

And he knew this was his mom without a doubt. The picture looked familiar and he could feel the faintest shadow memory of her forming in his brain. Even if the very thought of her was soaked in betrayal, Frank missed her so bad. He wanted her safe. He didn’t want his mom hunted by two scary-powerful organizations.

“Is there a way to delete records?” Frank asked Natalie suddenly.

Natalie’s eyes widened comically. “Um, I guess. But it alerts everyone with the program what was deleted. What are you going to do, Frank?”

“I don’t know yet,” Frank mumbled, and turned away from Natalie’s imploring look. He glanced back to the screen once again.

Frank clicked the link ‘Gerard Way’, wondering what this kid had to do with everything.

The page opened and Frank’s heart stopped. Sound went cotton-blocked, the dark became black and nothing mattered but the computer.

The right side of the screen was overtaken by a picture of a beautiful boy. He had hair that was dark and swooping across high, arched cheekbones. He was smiling in the picture, and Frank could clearly see it’d been cut from a picture with friends or something. The boy’s face was split by a wide, crooked smile and it was filled with adorable teeth and crinkling olive colored eyes.

Frank knew this boy. His entire body knew this boy. His blood, his brain, his heart. The world faded completely from around Frank as he read.

 

**_Gerard Way_ **

_Birthdate: April 9; age 17_

_Status: Alive_

_Family: Donna and Don Way, brother; Mikey Way_

_Location: Evacuated from New Jersey, no set safehouse in place_

_Ability: Influential to human emotions_

_History: Entered into Individual Information System April 10th. Safehouse: Los Angeles. LA Safehouse infiltrated by Jury, 15 years after Way’s birth. Donna and Don targeted by Jury for the murder of Californian Jury leader year before; status of both- deceased. Gerard and Mikey were reported without a safehouse for 2 years. Mikey Way reported kidnapped by Jury (retaliation for parents’ earlier offense) June of this year. Missing for three months. Gerard relocated to new safehouse in Newark, NJ. House leader: Brian Schechter. After the kidnapping in October, both Gerard and Mikey Way are under Schechter as guardian. All are in the process of evacuating the east coast. Contact household: 17142263677 (number subject to change)._

 

“Holy shit, there’s a number,” Frank whispered.

“Frank, you can’t. . .” Natalie reached for Frank’s hand. “You don’t even know these people. You might’ve even been the reason he was kidnapped.”

“No,” Frank said, voice firm. “I know him, I swear I recognize him. If there’s one thing I remember in my whole fucked up life, it’s that I would never have put him, or any other Individuals into danger.”

Frank had turned the chair to face Natalie, and gripped her hand tightly. This number was a fucking lifeline for Frank. This was the last link to his past. This was the answer to every question that’s kept him up at night in the last month. “I need to call it, Nat. I have to find out if they remember me. . . I need to find out about him,” Frank gestured to the picture of the beautiful boy on screen.

He saw the moment Natalie gave up: her shoulder dropped and she sighed, loud but endearingly. “Okay, Frank,” she said, pulling her hand from his and reaching for the glossy phone on Chris’s desk. “But I can’t promise you’ll like who they are or what they say.”

Frank couldn’t bring himself to care. When Natalie stretched out the phone to him, he grabbed it with shaking hands. Frank felt as if waves of apprehension should be humming off him as he began to punch in the numbers.

He hit Call.


	4. Chapter 4

Gerard's P.O.V

There was a loud crash. Gerard’s eyes jumped up from his sketchbook and his line of sight was filled with a half-naked Nate. The younger boy was running through their small apartment, shirtless, picking up the dirty clothes littering every open space on the floor.

Gerard remained confused until he spotted Brian rounding the corner of the living room, threats spewing from his mouth and the words ‘clean this place up’ rolling off his tongue repeatedly. 

Gerard jumped up as soon as Brian’s gaze was set upon him. He immediately started picking up the empty glasses and ripped magazines that were practically pieces of the room, based on how long they’d been there.

It was surprising that they’d only been here for three weeks, but the seven of them had made a mess fit for a home already. Gerard couldn’t help but regret that they even had to live like this, though, that their lives before were gone forever. That it was all his fault. 

At first, they’d stayed in Red Roof Inn’s and Motel 6’s. But as time passed- and the ‘all clear’ still wasn’t issued for them to move back to Jersey- Brian had started looking for a permanent place for them to stay. 

He’d found that place in the form of this apartment. It was located in upscale Tennessee, and the weather was the polar opposite of Newark’s. It was November and Gerard didn’t even need a coat to walk to his new high school. 

Speaking of which, the new school was also the opposite of his old one. It was bursting with colors: spirit red and brightly shaded smiles. Gerard knew Frank would’ve loved it, loved that nothing was gray, and it didn’t rain all the time (ruining both their hair). 

_And holy shit that thought hurt._

Gerard had been practicing shutting off his brain whenever Frank had came up. That had lasted a week, and now every time he thought of the boy (which was always) it felt like someone punched out his heart and stole his breath. 

Often, it was so bad that he’d end up on the floor, air moving too fast into his body and limbs trembling. It was those times that he literally felt like the loss would kill him.

Despite that, something always made him manage to get up and push the feelings into numbness. It was that- somewhere out there- Frank was safe. 

_Frankissafe, Frankissafe, Frankissafe,_ Frank isn't here, _but Frankissafe._

Gerard had found this quickly becoming his mantra. He’d said the words before he slept, he’d said them in his school classes, he’d said them when he felt like- despite what he knew was there- there was no color in the world anymore. 

Words from weeks ago rung in Gerard’s head as he cleaned: _“Frank won’t remember you, but Frank will be safe. He will be okay without you, and you’ll be okay without him. I promise.”_

The words had been from off Brian’s tongue, and they’d been empty promises and hidden pain. Gerard had thought agreeing was an act of love, that it was the right choice, but each day that passed without Frank, Gerard knew he’d made a mistake. Maybe the biggest of his life. 

“Gee, you’re overthinking.”

Gerard was snapped back to the present (where his hands were sticky from flat soda and his world was askew). 

It was Mikey who’d spoken. He’d appeared, conveniently, after Brian had apparently left the room. Gerard could just see the jagged points of Mikey’s folded wings beneath his brothers t-shirt, but there was no mistaking the concerned look on the other boy’s face. 

Mikey always seemed to know when Gerard’s mind was swallowing him, and not in the good, creative-processing way. Brian and the rest of the household were pretty good at it too, and they’d help Gerard sit down so his legs didn’t give out if he had a meltdown. 

“I know you’re thinking about Frank,” Mikey continued, stepping forward to take the forgotten glasses from Gerard’s hands. “And I know nothing I say will make you stop, but you need to remember that life goes on. Don’t let the pain swallow you like you did when mom and dad died, okay? Please.”

Gerard flinched, and he felt like every vein in his body contracted with the pain of the memories. Worse, Mikey was giving Gerard a pleading look, one Gerard had never seen before. 

It was true, he had been pretty much deadened by sadness after their parents had been killed. He’d gone through the stages of loss, then circled around and went through them again and again. 

The pain had only really started ebbing away in the last year, but then Gerard had lost Mikey, and now Frank - and suddenly Gerard could feel his entire body shaking. 

This was his life now. Win, lose, take, gain, and have it taken again. Some piece of Gerard was always missing, and Gerard would never settle with being a half-finished puzzle. 

_So why had he agreed to let Frank go?_

“Stop it, you’re doing it again,” Mikey’s voice went sort of high and panicky, and that’s when Gerard knew his brother needed him. There, in the present. 

Slowly, pushing Frank to the back of his mind (where he wouldn’t stay for long, the insistent and lovely fucker), Gerard wrapped his arms around Mikey. 

It was always awkward hugging him because of his spiky metal wings, but they’d both gotten used to the uncomfortableness. Mikey hugged back, and Gerard made promises that hung in the air between them, weighted with things they could never be. 

“I’m okay.”

“This won’t be like last time.”

“Everything will fall into place.” 

Mikey seemed to accept them; Gerard knew he’d never let himself. . .but that didn’t mean he wouldn’t try.

\--

It happened that night. 

Gerard was in the room he shared with Mikey, Nate, and Mark. 

In the moonlight, Mikey’s exposed wings glinted, and the shades over the windows painted stripes across the carpet. 

Everything was silent, save for the whooshing breaths of sleep. Which meant everyone was out cold except Gerard. 

Gerard hated that feeling. It was like everyone had gone away on an adventure, leaving Gerard waiting for the sun to rise or his eyes to bring the world to blackness.

Just as his body began to feel heavy, like he was sinking, there was a shrill noise. The sound jerked Gerard from the edge he was on, and his whole went ridge until he recognized the sound. 

It was Brian’s phone, resonating through the thin apartment walls. This wasn’t the first time the noise had woken any of them up, but still Gerard couldn’t manage to untense his body. Something was different this time. 

He heard Brian shake himself clumsily from sleep, then one of the phone’s rings was cut suddenly short. 

“Hello?” Sleep-logged Brian grumbled. 

There was a pause, so weighted the seconds were anvils on Gerard’s chest. 

Then: “Frank?!” 

That one word had Gerard throwing the anvils off, had him out of his bed, crashing to the floor and running out the bedroom door. 

Someone was suddenly up beside him. It was Mark. He must’ve been woken by the phone, and that meant he’d heard Brian’s shocked voice, too. 

Together they jostled their way down the hallway, and Gerard fell forward as he slammed open Brian’s bedroom door, ending up on his hands and knees. 

Brian was sitting on the edge of his slept-in bed, eyes wider than his sockets should’ve allowed them to be. He didn’t say anything at Gerard and Mark’s violent entrance, he just sat completely still and listened to whatever was being said on the other line. 

“That’s how you got this number?” Brian said. Gerard didn’t move from the floor and didn’t remove his eyes from the receiver in Brian’s hand. 

Brian suddenly angled his body away from the two boys who were listening in the doorway, as if that would muffle his voice when he said “You’re in Chicago?”

Gerard’s heart stopped. The UAI hadn’t told any of them where they had relocated Frank to- not even Brian- and now they knew.

And now that Gerard had that information, how would he ever be able to sleep knowing Frank was real and out there, and not even that far away? 

Pain flashed across Brian’s face suddenly, bringing Gerard crashing back to the dark bedroom that was too small for all of them and their nerves too. 

“No, Frank. We would never have left you. It-it was for your own safety,” Brian scrubbed at his face. “I-no Frank, we can’t.”

“Can’t what?” Gerard blurted out. “We can’t what, Brian? We can do it, whatever he wants, we can do it, we can-” 

Gerard was off his knees and stumbling toward Brian in a breath. One moment Brian had the phone clutched to his ear and the next, Gerard had the cool plastic in his own palm and the buttons were digging into his cheek. 

“Frank,” he breathed, and the word was the only thing in the entire world. It was the darkness and one name, and Gerard felt his whole body buzzing with apprehension. 

The pause before the response was filled with two speeding hearts. 

“Gerard?” 

The question mark at the end was like something piercing Gerard’s heart. That tone didn’t belong in Frank’s voice, that tone of disbelief and doubt and newfound recognition. 

But then relief washed away all the other emotions warring in Gerard’s body. Frank remembered him. Frank was safe, and Frank remembered. Everyone had talked him into letting Frank forget, but it must have not worked, and this was fate. 

“I love you.”

The words escaped out of Gerard’s mouth without looking back. They raced along with his skipping heart and they held every thought Gerard had had in the last month. 

Then, suddenly, the air was filled with a flat noise.

It took a minute for Gerard to place it, but when he did his newly patched heart shattered. 

The line was dead.

Frank had hung up. Frank was gone. Frank didn’t remember, Frank didn’t love him. _Frankfrankfrankfrankfrank._ All gone, again. 

Gerard was vaguely aware that he’d ended up on the floor again, receiver clutched to his chest. Hands were at his sides, trying to sooth, trying to take the phone. There were words too, but Gerard couldn’t hear them over his own choked sobs. 

He wasn’t even embarrassed that he was probably waking the whole house. He didn’t think twice about the fact that in less than a minute the room would be filled with people, and they’d all witness him break down. And probably watch him as he was unable to put himself back together again. 

Gerard curled up on himself and let himself unravel.


	5. Chapter Five

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gee's back! (well.....kinda haha)

Frank’s P.O.V.

The first thing Frank processed was Natalie’s fingers on the phone’s dock. Then he realized exactly what she’d done. She’d hung up. 

The words ‘I love you’ were still pulsing through his body with his blood, but now loss was there too. 

“No,” Frank said, standing suddenly so he was level with Natalie. “Why’d you do that? Why?”

Natalie looked guilty and pained. “I’m sorry, Frankie,” she mumbled, “it’s just that- it’s that I heard what he said. But you can’t leave because of that.”

Natalie turned pleading eyes onto Frank’s, and he still wasn’t exactly feeling the full shock of what’d just happened. 

“Frank, you need to stay here, where you’re safe,” Natalie continued, pleadingly. “The Jury’s after you again- that’s what Chris has been so stressed about. You can’t leave, you just can’t.”

The Jury was after him, and that meant they’d found out he’d been relocated. Which mean they were still after his mom. His life was still fucked. 

Then Frank had a stabbing realization. All of that meant that Frank couldn’t go back to Gerard. He couldn’t love Gerard back, because that would bring the Jury down on him too. Frank had already endangered Natalie and Alex and the others, and if Gerard could be safe from that, Frank would make sure he was. 

Frank would let this boy that he’d only just remembered go. 

Frank could tell that it would be the hardest thing he’d ever have to do. 

“Delete all the files on my mom,” Frank said flatly. 

Then he left a staring Natalie alone in the dark, and ghosted back to his bed, where he let himself unravel. 

\---

 

The world sort of lost its luster for a while after that. Frank didn’t really get up from his bed, other than for school, where he would immediately faze back out into his own tortured mind. He missed his old life- missed Gerard- so bad that it felt like some large animal had crawled inside his chest cavity and was now chewing the walls to shreds. 

Natalie and Alex grew visibly upset and concerned with Frank the longer he wallowed in the carnage of the phone call. Frank had already begged Natalie for the number again so he could call back, but she’d refused. 

Finally, a week later, Gerard’s voice had stopped ringing in Frank’s head long enough for him to do some actually thinking. 

Which soon led to a plan starting to fog Frank’s mind over. It filled the space in his head and distracted from the pain of the simple words Gerard had said to him.

Frank began spending most of his time in class and elsewhere sorting through the mind-fog, scraping forward details and then eventually forming a plan. It was both complicated and dangerous, but those had always been the first words in Frank’s dictionary. 

Finally, Frank had the words for what he wanted. 

After school one day, he pulled Natalie into his room and explained his plan. He was somewhat surprised when she agreed to it, but then again, Natalie was a lot like Frank. Unpredictable and fierce. 

“Don’t mention anything to Alex, please,” Frank said. 

“I won’t. We both love him too much to put him in a position like this. We should do this on our own. I was the one who promised you all the answers you wanted, after all.” Natalie looked determined, and that night she put Frank’s idea into motion. Once again she was sneaking into Chris’s office of secrets and this time not emerging until dawn. 

 

\-- _Always Keep Your Guard Up_ \-- 

The plan was to take place in a nightclub. It was a scoping ground of Jury members, and Frank had a sneaking suspicion the reason the activity here hadn’t been detected was because of the chaos the nightclub exuded. 

Natalie flashed her ID at the bouncer and was inside in less than a second. Frank, however, had a harder time, seeing as he looked like a big-boned 7 year old. After some persuading, Natalie managed to get him through the doors, though. 

The second they stepped across the threshold, the muffled pounding of house music that they’d heard outdoors became a living and consuming beast. It was as if Frank had had his vision clouded his entire life, and now was seeing the sterling night sky for the first time. Frank wondered why he’d never been into a club before. 

The air vibrated with the shimmering beat of a thousand hearts, all in time to the music. Frank could breathe in the mixing emotions of desperation, triumph, life, elation and mindlessness in the nightclub. 

The two combined made for the oddest sensation of having stepped into a different world. A place where it was okay to leave your bodies and strip down to the skeleton of what you really are. 

When they reached the end of the entrance hallway, they came to a balcony and two sets of descending stairs. 

Below them Frank could see the heart of the beast: a whirling tide of bodies, moving together as if linked to each other by fate’s puppeteer-strings. They were the blood and bone and nerves of the beast, and Frank wanted in. 

Natalie pulled him from his dance lust for a moment with a look, then she motioned to her pocket. Frank understood. Before they’d left she’d given Frank her phone and had borrowed Alex’s so they could stay in touch. 

Frank gave her the thumbs up, then watched as she dissolved into the beast’s body, slinky dress engulfed by all the others. 

It was his turn now, and Frank didn’t know what to think about the excitement that rose up into his throat. He merged with the stream going down the stairs, and found himself on the dance floor. Or at least where the dance floor would be, if it wasn’t painted with feet and legs and hypnotic strobes. 

Frank knew what he was supposed to do then, he’d seen the picture of the man he was looking for, and he knew how important this was. But none of that could reason with this beast. Frank was out of his league, out of his territory, and the heartbeat of this place filled his head with nothing else. 

He let himself be washed between people, finding the only way to move was to stop fighting the riptides. He bounced between leather-clad men and devilish women, finding himself dancing back to them more than once. 

There was something completely captivating about knowing he was seeing the souls of these people- that they’d left their shields at the door, and were sharing this madness with him. 

The music peaked into chaos and the notes shook themselves out in Frank’s veins. He let himself bask in it, moving and dancing and thoughtless- until the main strobes picked up and in the lightening flashes he began to pick out the little pills flowing around him. 

When one of them ended up in his hand, curtsey of the sequin-skin woman to his left, Frank knew he had to wake up and start fighting again. He had something he needed to do, and no white pill would help him achieve it. 

The lights went black, music swelling again into a new song, and Frank dropped the pill at his feet, and stepping on it on his way to the edge of the mass.

He felt the shape of it etched into the sole of his shoe for the next few minutes. But then he finally regained his sanity and wiped away any thoughts of going back into the beast’s heart for that little escape. 

Just as he reached one of the far walls of the club, where he could actually see the fanatic DJ at his booth, Frank caught sight of something. 

It was a boy, looking slightly out of place, weaving through the crowd. It was a flash of black hair and pale skin. Of dark clothes and swooping lips. 

It wasn’t the man he was looking for. It wasn’t anything Frank had expected. It was Gerard. 

Frank couldn’t breathe when he felt the other boy’s eyes land on him.

Gerard stopped his weaving suddenly, and they both just stared at each other over the thumping air and bouncing heads. 

Every space that wasn’t filled with the music was packed with words Frank needed to say as he watched his own name form on Gerard’s lips. 

Before another breath, the beast swept Gerard away and Fate’s puppet strings now had Frank, hurling him back into the heart after the boy. 

Gerard seemed to have mastered moving between the bodies, but every time Frank thought he’d lost him, something tugged him a direction and he’d catch sight of Gerard again. 

They were halfway across the floor when Frank realized Gerard was leading him somewhere. He sped up, pushing between sweaty limbs and trying to shake off the hands that tugged at his clothes nicely. 

Just then, the lights went black again, as they seemed to do every new song. The room inhaled, and suddenly the whole place practically exploded when the beat hit. Frank could physically feel the air moving, and then the strobed kicked in worse than before, and everything became that jerky-drug world. 

He’d truly lost Gerard this time, and the world felt like it had been turned upside down. Suddenly the strobes were too much, and Frank felt disconnected from his body as he someone swept him into their arms danced against him before passing him to another person. 

Then suddenly he ended up with someone’s arms around his waist and he looked up to find olive eyes and fate. It was Gerard, in the flesh. 

The boy spoke, and Frank watched his mouth to decipher the words. “Frank, I need you to come with me.”

_Of course I will_ , Frank thought. He would follow Gerard to the end of this universe, and fall with him into the next. 

Gerard grabbed Frank’s hand and together they maneuvered through the beast’s blood, through hands reaching and dancers smiling and pills tempting. But nothing could keep Frank from the raven-haired boy now. 

The ended up in a corner, so far back into the depths of the club that the music was muffled and the ground was visible. 

As soon as they got to where they could hear each other, Gerard tugged his hand from Frank’s and stepped back a good foot. 

The purposefully-put space made Frank’s heart clench, but before he could ask why it was there, Gerard began to speak. 

“Listen, Frank, I’m not Gerard. I don’t know if you remember me, but you need to come back to Gerard. He’s a mess, he’s a shade of what he used to be, even worse than when Mikey was gone. His love for you is literally consuming him, Frank. Please come back, I can help you avoid the UAI. Just . . don’t be gone forever, or Gerard will be too.”

It was the same high, raspy voice from the phone, but the words required stitching into sense before Frank could react. 

When he did, he was sure his face was comical. “Who’re you? Why do you look like Gerard?”

He was about to ask _‘what are you’_ , when the Gerard-person began to shimmer. The features that made Frank’s heartbeat fast began to move and melt, until a person Frank had never seen before stood before him. 

“Who are you?!” Frank echoed again, stepping back from the dimly lit corner a step.

“No! Don’t leave, Frank,” the kid (it really was just a kid) said. “Listen, I used to know you before you left. I’m Mark. I live with Gerard.”

Frank froze, and now the boy’s image sort of clicked somewhere in Frank’s brain. “So that’s your ability? You change into other people?”

Mark nodded, his blonde hair falling into his eyes. Frank suddenly realized that if anyone saw them, they’d get kicked out for being obviously underage. He moved in front of Mark more, hoping to block the kid from anyone who happened to pass by. 

“Yes, that’s my ability,” the kid’s eyes flashed. “I thought you wouldn’t remember about abilities?”

“My friends told me,” Frank replied. “Wait, does that mean you know why I can’t remember?” 

Mark tried to avoid looking at Frank for a second, but he cracked. “Gerard’s brother, Mikey, made you forget. Gee just wanted you safe from pain, he didn’t want you trying to find him and putting yourself into danger. He did it because he loves you, but I _know_ it was the wrong choice. There’s no place in our world for martyrs. You need to keep your guard up, and the things you love close.”

Mark finished, and Frank was shocked how much sense this kid made. Frank was stupid for thinking Gerard would be better without him. Gerard needed him just as much as Frank needed him. 

And that’s when Frank truly realized he loved Gerard. More than anything, more than the changing seasons, and more than music, and more than the way rain sounds as it hits the window. 

“I’ll come with you,” Frank said simply. 

They shared beyond-happy looks for a moment. 

“But, wait,” Frank suddenly thought of something, “how’d you get here?”

Mark looked sheepish, like he didn’t want to answer. “Your phone call. I- I did some research to find you, after Gerard completely lost it when you hung up. It really wasn’t that hard to get up here and follow you. . .”

Frank shook his head in disbelief, unable to comprehend that a fucking kid had managed to track him down so easily. Before he could say anything back, Frank’s phone pierced the air with its shrill beeping. 

Frank answered. “Natalie?”

“Frank!” came Natalie’s voice. She must’ve been somewhere like they were, because Frank didn’t have to struggle to hear her. 

“Listen, I’ve found him. He’s at the bar. Frank, I’m going to get him to the women’s bathroom- don’t make that face I know you’re making. Anyways meet me there in ten minutes, I’ll need your help.”

Natalie hung up without a goodbye, and Frank whirled to Mark.

“You need to wait for me. I have something I absolutely have to do.”

Frank knew what Mark was going to say before the words left the boy’s mouth. “I’m coming with you.”  
-

 

Back onto the dance floor, Frank kept his hand on Mark’s arm, and shook off the floaty-feeling the music tried to swing him into.

It took them a good ten minutes just to get to the bathrooms, and Frank could already tell Natalie was in the girls’ room. The door was closed, and two women, obviously wasted, where attempting to muscle it open. 

Frank moved them aside, and they slurred complaints. He blocked them out, and pounded on the door. 

“Natalie, open up!”

A second later, the deadbolt slid out and the door cracked open enough for Frank to haul his body inside, dragging Mark behind him. 

The light inside the bathroom was blinding compared to the club’s main body. There was a row of stalls down one wall, and sinks down the other. Natalie stood in between them her slinky, slightly rumbled dress, and her hair askew.

Other than that, she was unharmed and Frank thanked the gods that she had super-strength, or this whole plan would’ve failed the second the man had started fighting back. 

Frank locked the door again, and turned back to Natalie. “Where is he?”

“In that stall,” she pointed, “I’ve got him handcuffed to the toilet like they do in movies.”

Frank grinned at that, and finally let go of his death grip on Mark (who looked beyond confused). 

Frank approached the stall Natalie had indicated, and he could hear something struggling behind the dingy door. 

“I’m coming in,” Frank announced, then he swiftly brought the door swinging inward, not paying mind when it pushed against the man’s limbs. 

When Frank finally stood in the doorway, he could see the guy. He was bald with beady eyes and hate exuding from his skin. Frank had no idea how he’d even managed to fit into the club’s crowd, he was so uncanny. 

Frank had no doubt that this was the man. The leader of the Illinois Jury, Alton Kerry. Frank had seen this man’s face plastered across the alerts Natalie had found. It’d taken her hours to find any trace of the man before them, but now they had the devil at their feet. At their will. 

“Let me go, you fuckers. Or I swear I will kill you, I will exterminate all of your sick race,” the man spit, face twisting with the poison of his words. 

“Not my race,” Frank answered cooly, “but my family. You’re the sick one, you know that?”

Frank thought the man was going to spit in his face, but he only jerked his cuffed hands angrily. 

The part Frank was unsure of was approaching, and wanted to get it over as quickly as possible. He had a reason for this. He needed to protect the people he loved, and this was the first way he knew how. 

And he had to admit, this had to do with him too. The only way he could be with Gerard, was to do this. 

“Okay, Nat. We should do it now,” Frank said, already feeling queazy. 

This wasn’t him. He couldn’t bear the thought of an animal getting hurt, and now it was human (a sadistic, killer) but it wasn’t right. 

Natalie noticed Frank’s facial expression, and immediately her face softened. 

“You don’t have to be here. You can wait outside,” she said, stepping up to Frank and cupping his face. 

Frank shook his head. “I’ll stay here. But I can’t watch.”

Natalie understood. She let go of Frank, and disappeared into the stall. Frank turned to Mark and together they made pained faces as yells of pain filled the bathroom, and Natalie’s voice hissed threats. 

Frank was close to rushing out of the bathroom so he could vomit in peace when finally Natalie emerged, looking upset. But in her hand she held what they wanted- a sleek black phone. 

She brought it over to Frank, unlocked it and put it into his palm. 

“Is he dead?” Frank whimpered.

“No,” Natalie responded, but before relief could recolor Frank’s face, she continued. “But he managed to call backup, Frank. You don’t have that much time.”

Frank’s heart jumped to knot in his throat, and he looked at the screen for a long minute. 

Finally, Natalie opened an unmarked program. Frank would’ve been shocked that both waring sides of this heaven and hell had the same technology, but he was distracted. 

He went to the search bar of the program, and typed in “Iero”. And from there, he proceeded to delete all files that were tagged with his name, both about him and his mother. 

This was for her. He would make it safe for her to come back to him. It’d taken awhile, but Frank knew he was ready to forgive her.

_That’s the thing about love. It bigger than everything. Even Fate._

The files disappeared one by one, and Frank knew they’d be gone for good. This was an executive phone, so in his palm, Frank held the key to erasing the past more effectively than even Mikey could. 

When he hit ‘delete’ on the last file, which had taken awhile, Frank dropped the phone to the ground and crushed it using all his weight. 

He looked up to find two sets of eyes on him, and it was like looking down those two roads in Robert Frost’s poem. 

_Two roads diverge in a yellow wood,  
And sorry I could not travel both._

Frank had a decision to make soon. Fate and Love and not enough time to think. 

Natalie gave him even less when she grabbed his hand, threw the lock on the door, tugging the joints in Frank’s arm painfully with her strength. Frank barely had time to snatch up Mark’s hand before the three of them plunged back into the dark heartbeat of the nightclub. 

Frank was tired of this beast by now. The strobes were old and the magic feeling was fading. Now when Frank looked around him, instead of open and free people, he saw drunk and desperate shells of humans. This wasn’t where he belonged, no matter the pull in his veins. 

Natalie looked as panicked as Frank had ever seen her. The fact that the Jury would probably be descending on this place in minutes hadn’t fully registered with Frank. But still he made himself run, and struggle through the masses. 

They were exactly in the middle of the floor when there was a sudden surge away from the stairs. Figures were descending into the room, and they obviously didn’t match here. They had their armor on in a crowd of vulnerable people, and they plowed down the stairs in the dozens. Light flashed off metal limbs and makeshift weapons. 

Frank’s stomach dropped into his feet. The spotlights played patterns across everyone’s sweaty faces, and then stretched to illuminate the Jury as they merged with the beast’s blood, reducing it to a pet, something timid compared to the vicious animal now amongst their midst. 

“They’re here!” Natalie screamed, and in a half-second fear was the only thing Frank could see in her dark eyes. This must be the first time she’d encountered them. 

This felt Frank’s first time, too. The way his blood dragged in his limbs, pulsed in until fear was so thick in Frank’s throat that it felt like he was breathing cement.

“Move!” Mark shouted suddenly, and Frank realized they’d slowed in their terror. They began their struggling run again, as half of the room went into chaos, and the other half continued to dance, too drugged-out to notice. 

They’d moved only a few feet when the lights went black again, and a new song began to pounce around the room, jolting everybody into movement. Suddenly, Mark was ripped from Frank’s hand, and Frank stopped moving immediately. 

Natalie whipped her head around to look back at him. “We need to go! We’ll be cornered!” she screamed, her voice raw. She had been leading them to the emergency exit across the floor from them. 

Mark was being pulled farther away every second, and then the decsion was upon Frank. Natalie or Mark. His new life or his old. 

Maybe even life or death. 

And as the music picked up as it always did, Frank knew he’d always had this decision made. 

“I’m sorry, Nat,” Frank said drawing her close to him in the pandemonium. He knew she understood by the way her eyes filled and she shook her head wildly. 

“He’s my chance to have my old life back, as complete as it’ll ever be. But I need you to be safe. Get out of here, don’t die, especially not here,” Frank’s voice choked as it traveled past the lump in his throat. 

“I love you enough to let you go, Frank. That’s always been my real talent. Letting the people I love leave,” Natalie said right near his ear, and the chaos was right at their side, and Mark was farther way than ever, but Frank suddenly didn’t want to let Natalie go ever. 

Natalie made the choice for him, though. Before Frank could say anything else to her, she’d stretched up to Frank’s mouth and kissed him. It was quick and its pain remained on Frank’s lips after Natalie had ducked through the crowd and out of Frank’s sight. 

Frank whirled and violently pushed his way toward where Mark had been carried off. Suddenly, there were Jury members around Frank, holding violent instruments and looking pinched with hate. Since they didn’t know Frank was here, he ducked between them as they came and prayed he wouldn’t be recognized. 

A woman with an obvious gun-holster bulge brushed past Frank, and Frank’s knees went weak. He was literally touching death on all sides. Before Frank could begin hyperventilating though, he caught sight of Mark. 

The younger boy had just been spat off the dance floor, chewed and deposited. Now panicking club-goers were highheel smacking by him and Frank was terrified the boy would be trampled. 

That visual had Frank taking full advantage of his smallness, and immediately he was practically crawling between searching Jury members and the dancers they shoved aside.

He caught snatches from the members’ mouths as he ducked and dashed and kneeled. They were looking for Kerry, so they’d know who to kill. They were blocking every exit, and Frank prayed Natalie had muscled her way to safety. 

He reached Mark just then, and helped pull the shocked boy off the sticky ground and into his arms. Frank held him close for a moment, and felt a deep protectiveness for the boy, then they pulled apart. 

“How will we get out?” Mark asked, looking at Frank with wide eyes. The jacket he’d been wearing as Gerard was too big, and it dwarfed him now. The fact that he was just a kid hit Frank again, and Frank’s heart constricted. 

“I don’t know,” Frank said. Mark sensed Frank’s hopelessness and shook his head. 

Then he began to take off the giant jacket, and handed it off to Frank. Every movement they made was hurried, and Frank had it on without questioning. 

“Okay, then we’ll just have to wing it,” Mark said, “Pull that thing’s hood up and I’m going to change into someone else.”

Frank obliged, glad someone had stepped up, even though he knew he was supposed to be the protector.

A moment later, and Frank knew the Jury had found the hand-cuffed Kerry. They were prowling the crowd more purposefully now, somehow more violent than ever. Frank watched a man hit a dancer with the pole he held, and then continue on with his seeking eyes. 

“We’ve only got seconds before they find us or kill the entire club trying.”

Frank turned his attention back to where Mark had been, but now a man he’d never seen stood in the kid’s place. 

It was uncanny, knowing that inside that body was Mark. Mark seemed just fine with it, though, and he snatched Frank’s hand and they were running again. 

The world blurred around them and the first screams broke the air as more people were victimized by the Jury. Fear made everything red, and suddenly people were looking at Frank and Mark as they ran, not toward the exit, but to the DJ booth. 

Mark heaved himself onto the platform, which the DJ had obviously abandoned. Frank followed, and before he was even completely standing, Mark was at the controls flipping switches and pushing things blindly. 

“What are you doing?!” Frank shouted.

Mark didn’t answer, continuing his frantic pressing. Frank stood motionless as the lights flickered and the music skipped and confetti shot from canons. It was like a drugged nightmare, the music sucking the screams from peoples’ mouths, gruesome weapons and evil wielding them, all while the party continued and the spotlights pulsed colors. 

Suddenly, Mark shouted “Move!” and Frank did just as a giant flame shot upwards from a hole that had been right beneath his feet. 

The nightclub’s pyromantic system.   
-

 

It took them less than five minutes to have everything ready. They’d found as much flammable matter as they could, and Mark had positioned it so that it blocked the flame tubes. 

Just as a large group of Jury members had started battling their way toward the DJ platform (obviously having found their target), Mark hit the button. 

The fire started in between one blink and the other. The stale air in the club was lit by the licking flames, and the force of the flames being shot upward made the makeshift tinder (their shirts and business cards for strippers) rain down across the club. 

The music was now out of control, too-loud and shaking the entire foundation of the building. Frank could barely think, other than to know that their plan had worked.

Everything was chaos. Worse than the chaos of any of the minutes before- this was madness. This was what it looked like when you kicked an ant hill. The Jury didn’t stand a chance. 

Everyone was moving now, trying to run, pushing and kicking. The Jury members were being eaten by the crowd under the flames’ crackling. They were swept into the terror, and the group that had sighted Frank and Mark was washed into the great, panicking tide. 

Frank grabbed for Mark, and together they jumped from the platform, where fire had raced across the DJ booth and up the walls. They ran through the smoke and the people, moving with the others. 

There were times when they were fleeing death that the world slowed down, and times when it moved to fast that Frank’s brain went haywire. There was even a time when Frank lost Mark’s hand again, and both their hearts stopped until their fingers touched again. 

Within a few minutes, there was more smoke than oxygen in the air, and people were moving too slow. Frank was sure then that he was going to die. That death was at his heels and this was the end. 

And with that acceptance, there came a flood of images. 

_A cell. Smoke inking the sky and his name being shouted, then the walls exploding and blackness._

Suddenly, Frank knew that this was his chance to rewrite fate. He had failed before, when he was knocked out. But now everything was the same, the fire and the panic and people to save. 

They could see the exit now, and the smoke was billowing out into the night, followed by the club-goers. But Frank could also see that no one would last that long, everyone was too confused and had too much of this smoke in their lungs. 

Frank thought of Mark, and his decision was made.

He knew what had to do, and rushed forward, pushing and pulling and rearranging people. Somewhere behind him, Mark yelled, but Frank didn’t listen. 

Frank began pushing the people out the door as soon as he reached it, dispersing the buildup that was forming. 

Anyone who looked drugged got an extra hard push, so that they couldn’t get lost on their way over the threshold. When Mark appeared, Frank also gave him a hard shove, watching the boy stumble into the night. And then Frank was finally okay with the weight of his fate, knowing that Mark would live. 

Frank continued pulling bodies from the wall of smoke and pushing them to fresh air. Over and over he did it until the tide dwindled into a stream, and then a trickle. And by then the fire was on Frank, licking his knuckles and catching on his jacket. 

Hope flared as hot as the fire in Frank chest, then. There was no one else to save, and the door to the rest of his life was only a foot away. 

Frank turned, moving slow and feeling thick with smoke. His jacket was burning every inch of skin it touched, but nothing could stop Frank now. 

At the brink of his last breath, Frank stumbled out of the exit, and spilled out onto concrete. He managed to register the sweetest taste of pure air and the motion of hands on him. Then the world faded to black, like the lights dimming after a play. 

The curtains closed, and Frank's brain went black.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Frank's not dead, don't worry


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've decided to attach the epilogue, so there's now one more chapter

\---

It’d been two weeks since the nightclub fire. The Jury seemed to have back off of Frank’s trail, though no one knew why. Chris believed that they were planning some sort of retaliation, and that scared the shit out of Frank. 

Oblivious to the Individual world, the media had kept a constant stream of coverage on the story over the weeks.They would describe the attacks on clubgoers just moments before the fire, and how the world was lucky no one had been seriously hurt.

It was a big enough deal that there’d been reporters waiting for Frank when he’d woken up in the hospital, lungs aching and skin burnt. Chris had managed to get rid of them, saving Frank from having to recall everything and risk being seen on TV. 

A week ago, Frank had been released from the hospital with tons of painkillers pumping through his veins. He’d been surprised when Aaronlyn and Chris had taken him back to the apartment, and not some cheap hotel in the suburbs. 

“The UAI haven’t issued an evacuation, so we haven’t left.” Chris had explained, and Frank had felt relief bloom in his chest. He couldn’t imagine having uprooted another family due to his fuck-ups. 

Frank had limped into the apartment, and the clean white walls and friendly faces had almost made him cry. Natalie had wrapped him in a hug, Lucie joining and smashing her face against Frank’s legs (the only place she could reach). Alex had hugged Frank too, without a single joke. Frank had been struck speechless by Alex’s muteness- and had finally realized that Alex must’ve been really upset- too upset even for jokes. 

Frank’s happiness had stopped there, however. Frank had learned that Mark had left. Disappearing in the night, before Frank could come with him or even say goodbye. Chris and everyone had tried to comfort Frank, they’d tried to convince him it was better this way. That Mark and Gerard would be okay- okay and safe. 

Frank had let them keep telling him that for weeks now. It wasn’t that he believed it- it was that he didn’t have anything else to have faith in. No phone number, the other had been disconnected, and no idea where his old family was. No way back to the past. 

\--

Frank went back to school eventually, feeling as incomplete as ever. He spent his classes planning ways to get back to Gerard, then feeling crushing loss at the thought of leaving the family he’d found here. 

He also spent a lot of time wondering about his mom. If she was okay, and if she’d stopped hiding. If she was looking for Frank. 

The only thing that stopped his consuming thoughts was smoking. Frank knew his doctors would have aneurisms if they knew, but he did it anyways. The shade of the smoke comforted him. Frank felt that if he was a color, he’d be cigarette smoke gray, definitely. 

Frank was smoking one day, leaning against the school’s wall in the freezing cold. He was on his fourth cigarette and second missed class when someone came around the corner. 

The kid was stocky, and looked even more out of place in the school’s uniform than Frank. He had short blonde hair, a lip ring, and his own cigarette in his hand.

Frank was still staring when the kid finally caught sight of him. The boy’s mouth dropped open, and his cigarette dropped into the snow- sizzling. Frank’s reaction was pretty much the same. 

“Frank?!” the boy shouted, then he had his arms around Frank’s middle, and they were squeezing each other as if the world was falling away around them. 

It took Frank a moment for the name to surface on his tongue, but when it did, he felt his chest swell as big as his grin. “Bob!”

Bob had picked Frank up off the frosted ground and Frank’s feet were swinging around and the air warmed over with their laughs. 

“I can’t believe you’re here! I can’t believe you’re alive, Frankie,” Bob roared when he let Frank down.

“I- I really can’t either,” Frank said, his entire face hurting from grinning. “I also can’t believe I remember you.”

“Why wouldn’t you, Frank?” Bob managed to raise his voice even louder.

Frank realized what he’d said, but managed to shrug it off with a question. “Why can’t you believe I’m alive?”

Bob’s mouth dropped open even wider than before. “Frank. You’ve been missing for two months. The police always insisted you’d moved, but Ray and I knew better. Haven’t you seen all the messages we’ve sent you? The calls? We’ve been putting up posters for you, you fuck!” Bob was out of breath, huffing and angry but his face was open and sincere. 

Frank’s heart swelled again. _They’d looked for him. He hadn’t been wiped from his old life completely. They’d put up fucking posters!_

Frank could picture Bob, with a guy with an afro- Ray- trudging through the Jersey snow and rain to tack up ugly pictures of Frank around the town. 

Just the thought had Frank back to attacking Bob with hugs. With every second, Frank could feel his memories stitching up their holes, and being with Bob was as easy as breathing. 

He pulled away again, then quickly fumbled in his pocket for new cigarettes, feeling bad about making Bob drop his. They lit up together, but Bob’s eyes never left Frank’s face, as if Frank would dissipate into the freezing air like melting snow. 

Frank blew out his smoke and smiled at Bob. “Yeah- about my phone- I haven’t had it in two months. Some shit went down, and since then I’ve been here.”

Bob looked skeptical, but he didn't press him. “Okay. As long as you were safe. And as long as you come home, Frankie.”

Frank paused with his cigarette halfway to his mouth. “This is my home. . . and you’re here now. Why would I leave?”

Bob was silent for a long moment. “I am here. I was born and raised here, Frank,” Bob looked at Frank seriously, “but you don’t belong here. You’re Jersey through and through. And what about Gerard? What happened to you loving him?”

Frank’s mouth went dry. So many things were bouncing around in his head, and none of them would shut up and let him think. He belonged in Jersey. . . but he also belonged here. He belonged with Gerard, but he also belonged with Bob. It was the same decision Frank had refused to make in the nightclub’s bathroom. 

Choose between _then_ and _now_. 

Frank went with the easiest question he could pick out of the chaos in his head. “I thought Gerard wasn’t in Jersey anymore?”

Bob blew his smoke away from them and shook his head. “No, he’s back. His whole family was gone for a while, but they moved back just before I left. I never got to see Gee, but Ray said he got a call from him- asking about you.”

“ _Me._ ” The syllable rolled off Frank’s tongue, and suddenly late-night words were ringing in his head the loudest. _‘I love you’._

Then Frank knew what he had to do, he knew the solution to one problem, and was able to push the others to the back of his mind. 

“Thanks, Bobby,” Frank smiled. 

And for once, Bob didn’t try to hurt Frank for the nickname. Instead the boy just grinned and hugged Frank tightly once again. Fate had brought them together, and Frank would keep it that way. 

\---  
The plane ride was long. Frank’s legs were cramped and the seat smelled musty, but when the pilot came over the PA system to announce their descent, nothing could’ve kept the grin from Frank’s face. 

Chris had been reluctant about the trip at first, but he’d eventually accepted that Frank was an adult- independent and lovestruck. 

Still, he’d insisted on debriefing Frank on all the safety rules he could think of, and had still packed at least seven bags of Swedish Fish for Frank’s flight. 

Just a few hours ago Frank had said his goodbyes and had pretended he wasn’t half-crying when he boarded the plane. He knew he’d be back, just not when.

He told himself it’d be worth being away from them, just for the moment he knew was coming. He was finding his fate this time, instead of it finding him.   
The plane landed, and Frank grabbed his backpack from the overhead compartment and was down the aisle in a second. 

Outside the airport, Frank waited for a cab in the freezing, wet air with a grin on his face. The breeze smelled like city-lights and smoke and home. 

He instructed the cab driver, then itched with anticipation the entire ride. 

The car pulled into a glossy neighborhood, and Frank could feel his heart in every inch of his body. 

The house was as pristine as it was in Frank’s newfound memory. It was everything good in the world; it was sandy and gorgeous and it held the entire universe.

Frank paid the driver and started up the sprawling lawn. Every step was a day that Frank had spent away. Every breath was heavy with hope.

The doorbell chimed under Frank’s fingers, and the moment between its call and the door’s answer was forever. 

It must’ve been fate that made Gerard answer the door, still in his pajamas. 

Frank didn’t even get to catalog Gerard’s face- the way his perfect lips dropped open, or the way his eyebrows shot up, or the painfully-sweet emotion that was in his eyes- before he was lunging forward, bringing their lips together.

Finally. 

Frank’s hands cupped Gerard’s face, brushing his hair back and trailing his fingers over Gerard’s cheekbones. Gerard brought their bodies together, bunching his hands in the back of Frank jacket. Frank titled his head up so that the moment was perfect, and Gerard gasped half-words against their lips. 

The air around them swirled with colors, more vibrant that Frank had ever imagined. It wrapped around them as they wrapped around each other, and the colors danced and merged. 

Finally, Frank managed to pull away, and it felt like tearing his soul. After he caught his breath, he grinned up into the face of the boy he loved, and very lightly said, “You have a lot of explaining to do.”

THE END

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fate is something I believe in strongly, and that’s why it’s so redundant in this story. Find your fate or let it find you, and be happy(: 
> 
> Anyways thank you all!


	7. Epilogue

“Frankie, you awake?” 

The voice warmed the darkness, and shook Frank from sleep. His eyes cracked open to Gerard’s room and the moonlight patterned carpet. 

Wrapped in blankets, Frank turned around in the too-small bed so that he faced Gerard, who the voice belonged to.Through a cloud of sleep, Frank smiled. “Yeah,” he whispered.

Moonlight touched the outline of Gerard’s cheekbone and flared out with his messy black hair. Shadow mixed with the softness of his features, and Frank could’ve stayed in that moment, in between words, for the rest of his life. 

“I just wanted to hear your voice,” Gerard’s said quietly. Under the warmth of the blankets, Frank felt Gerard’s arms snake around his waist. Gerard pulled him forward to close the centimeters of space between them and Frank buried his face into the dip between Gerard’s pale neck and collarbone. 

Gerard slipped one of his legs between Frank’s and Frank placed a kiss on the nearest patch of throat that his mouth could reach. He thoroughly planned to follow through, but his eyes were already slipping down like weights and it was so warm. 

He’d been here for less than a week, but it was like home now that Gerard was with him. It was like their months apart and their lack of memory had been washed away with the snow that fell outside. 

“Is this my Batman shirt?” Gerard tugged suddenly at the cloth on Frank’s torso and laughed airily into Frank’s hair, already knowing the answer. Frank kissed the patch of throat again. 

Soon, the darkness snuck up between them and Frank was lulled back to sleep by his boyfriend’s breathing and the warmth of the too-small bed they shared. 

An hour or so later, though, as it always seemed to play out, everything changed. For the second time that night, Frank was tugged out of sleep, this time by Gerard’s body tensing. 

“What is it?” Frank whispered, more awake then ever. 

“There’s someone outside,” Gerard whispered back, and the previous calm of the room shattered. 

Frank was pushing himself up out of the sheets in a second, tripping over things in the dark. When Gerard tried to follow, Frank held the other boy down with a gentle hand on his chest. 

Gerard watched with wide eyes and sleep-crazed hair as Frank inched across the messy room to the window. Silently, Frank lifted up a slat of the blinds and peered through. 

Outside the lawn was like a page of white snow, a blank ocean ready for the writing of the coming day. 

He was about to turn back to Gerard when he saw the dips in the snow, close to the driveway and almost undistinguishable. _Footprints._

“Gee,” Frank whispered, and Gerard was standing next to Frank in a second, arms wrapped protectively around the Frank’s hips. 

Gerard spotted the footprints quicker than Frank had and he drew in a sharp breath, his pink lips forming a perfect “o”. 

After a moment of stillness, Gerard spoke. “There’s only one person down there. They’re on the porch and-and I can’t really tell what they’re feeling. It’s too jumbled.”

“Is it the Jury?” Frank asked, his eyes widening to the point of pain. He gripped Gerard closer to his body, as if that would ward off whoever was downstairs. 

“I don’t think so. . . anyways, most of the Jury left after what happened last September. I think it’s someone else,” Gerard’s voice was right in Frank’s ear and Frank wanted nothing more than to climb back into bed with him and forget the world. 

Instead, all thoughts were interrupted by the house’s doorbell resonating through the halls and the sound of sleep being shaken off by the house’s inhabitants. 

“Definitely not the Jury,” Frank commented, then laced his fingers with Gerard’s and pulled them out into the hallway. 

Mikey met them in the hall, and flashed Frank his now- customary apologetic look, even though Frank had already forgiven him a thousand times for the last months.

Next, Mark found Frank’s side as they filed down the dark hall, and Frank tugged the boy to his side in a short hug. 

Brian was the last to burst out his room, still shaking sleep from his body. “No one go downstairs!” he barked, but no one listened. Emerson was already leading the group down the elaborate front staircase, and Nate was flipping lights on as he went. It was the polar opposite of what everyone would’ve been doing a few months prior, when the Jury still posed a threat to them. 

They did, however, wait until Brian stumbled down the stairs before moving toward the beckoning door and whoever was beyond. Brian fumed and tightened his bathrobe like a stereotypical dad who’d just caught his daughter walking in 2 hours after curfew. “You guys are lucky I don’t sense anything here, or you all would’ve faced my wrath.”

Behind Frank, Nate giggled and Mark whispered “my wrath” mockingly. Frank was glad everyone was taking this lightly, but personally, he sided with Brian. This wasn’t normal, this was wrong. 

Gerard tensed as soon as Brian began to crack the heavy front door open. Suddenly, Gerard’s body was in front of Frank’s and the door was open all the way. 

Freezing air whooshed in, and it seemed to freeze over Frank’s bones and the younger kids’ laughter. Frank remained behind Gerard until the other boy spoke. “You shouldn’t be here,” Gerard’s voice achieved menace, despite its highness. 

Frank finally unstuck himself and moved to see who filled the doorway and who had rendered everyone but Gee speechless. 

In the hollow that led to the night, the warm light of the house leaked out onto the snow and illuminated the small woman on the porch. 

“Mom.”

Frank’s voice broke, and he was outside before the word could even fully force itself out of his mouth. He wrapped his mother into his arms, and ignored the bite of his bare feet on the snowy porch. 

“Frankie,” Gerard had come up behind him, and concern colored his voice. But for the first time ever, Frank didn’t turn to comfort his boyfriend. Instead he stayed with his mom, who was hugging him back with all her strength. 

In that moment it didn’t matter that she’d completely abandoned him, or that she’d lied to him his entire life, or even that she was what was considered to be the enemy. They were just a mother and a son, somehow brought together again. 

The cold finally got to them, though, and that’s how Frank found himself with his mom in Gerard’s lush living room. The atmosphere swam with tension and unspoken accusations. 

Frank sat next to his mother on a cream colored couch, and Gerard stood at the sofa’s arm. He kept inching nearer to Frank and casting him worried glances. Frank really just wanted to draw Gerard down next to him for cigarette and sleep scented comfort, but there was so much more to deal with. 

“Normally, I wouldn’t have even let you walk on our property,” Brian started, “but this is an exception. We all love Frank very much, and despite my every instinct to kick you out, I know you have things to say to him. So speak.”

Frank’s mother looked small and defeated, but she took Brian’s words without a flinch. 

“Frankie,” her eyes turned to Frank’s face and she seemed to gather her strength. “I’m so sorry, baby. . . When I joined the Jury, I never thought it’d effect you. In fact, your father and I thought it would be a way of protecting you. We were raised to think people like,” she glanced around the room, eyes lingering on Gerard, “you guys, were evil. My parents taught me that they were the devil’s work, and that they would eradicate humans if not controlled.

But when you brought Gerard over that day, it was the first time I’d ever questioned what I’d been raised on. He was everything I was supposed to hate, but he was just a _kid_. He made me think of the Individuals I’d helped put to death, and how they were humans too, that they had children and had once been kids themselves.”

The room was silent and motionless. Frank’s mom pulled her jacket closer around her and continued. 

“But what really hit me, Frank, was how much he loved you. I could see it in his every movement, in his aura and how he looked at you. Things that the devil touch can’t love as strongly as he seemed to love you, Frankie. And that was when I knew for sure that I was wrong, and that my life had been a mistake.”

Frank’s mouth had gone dry, and the words he wanted to say couldn’t scrape by to reach the room. 

Just when he thought that he might choke on his own silence, a slender hand fluttered down to take Frank’s. Frank’s head shot up, and it was like he was seeing Gerard for the first time- months ago in a cafeteria. The world slowed, and all that was left was pale skin, olive eyes, and comfort. 

Frank’s face was still turned up to Gerard’s when his mom began speaking again. The story had to go on. 

“I never mentioned Gerard to any of the other members. I never sold him out, though I knew the organization was looking for him. Each day his name weighed less and less on my tongue as I sat through the Jury’s meetings. I was beginning to see the flaws and the evil being spewed during those meetings, and it made me sick. 

I threw myself into my work, though, trying to compensate for my secrets and doubt. I thought if I became a more active member, less suspicion would be placed on me. I did anything that would keep the Jury away from Frank and who he loved. But it wasn’t enough.”

They all knew what had happened from there. Someone had found out about Gerard, and Frank’s life had gone to shit. 

Words finally found their way to Frank’s mouth then, but they felt like fire as they moved off his tongue. “I believe you, but what I don’t understand is why you left me. If you loved me so much to go against the Jury, why would you just abandon me? And why are you back now?” 

_Did you even look for me when I ended up halfway across the country?_ Frank thought. 

Tears glassed over his mom’s eyes, and they were the color of shame. Frank almost felt bad for speaking. 

“I didn’t think it through,” she said. “I panicked, and I left. It was after the fact that I decided not to come back for you, Frankie, and I’m sorry for that. I figured the Jury would leave you alone if I did, and I thought you’d be safe here. But when they took you, I tried to get back here, but the Jury was catching up to me. They were mad that I abandoned my position, and that I’d committed the ultimate betrayal by hiding Gerard.”

Frank’s hand was numb but he saw Gerard’s fingers tighten around his own. He had no idea what Gerard was thinking, but he squeezed back. 

“And then I heard that you’d been relocated, and my heart broke.” Frank’s mom went on. “I wanted you back, but I knew you were safer, baby. I trusted the Individuals to keep you away from the Jury, but I’m still so sorry. Just know that I thought of you every moment of every day.”

The silence returned to the room when his mother was done speaking. Brian opened his mouth to speak after a moment, but Frank beat him to it. 

“Okay,” Frank took a deep breath, “I forgive you. There’s not enough time in life for me not to. And I love you, mom, but from now on I won’t trust you. Do you understand that?”

“Yes,” was the weak reply. 

Frank closed his mouth, feeling the gaping hole in his chest that had been there for months, closing. He finally had all of his answers, and all of his puzzle pieces back in place. 

Brian spoke then. “So you came here to talk to Frank, but where will you go now?” His face and words were stoic. 

“You can’t stay here and you can’t possibly expect Frank to follow you to wherever you go. He’s an adult now, and while he can forgive you, I can’t. You endangered my family and my kin. And despite your lack of system data, neither the individuals or the Jury will have forgotten you so quickly. So where will you go?” Brian repeated. 

Before the quiet could settle again, Frank spoke with his heartbeat in his ears.

“I know where.”

And those words were followed by a plan. 

\--

After everything was said, Frank’s mom left and the house began to shut its eyes to sleep again. 

The eight of them filed back upstairs, and Frank smiled as the weight of the world shifted from his shoulders.

As they all walked, Mikey held Nate’s hand, Emerson ruffled Mark’s hair, and Brian flicked off the lights as he made his way back to bed. 

Gerard’s fingers were laced with Frank’s, and he looked how Frank felt: relieved. When Frank glanced over, the boy flashed him a toothy smile that made Frank’s heart jump. Knowing he’d be seeing that smile for the foreseeable future made it jump even more, and Frank couldn’t help but let a grin split his face as wide as possible. 

Gerard giggled and then all the lights were off and doors were closing and it was just the two of them in the hallway. 

Back in Gee’s dark bedroom, the shadows were warm and sleepy. Frank pulled his hand from Gerard’s so that he could move them to the taller boy’s wide face. Moonlight still played across their faces and Gerard’s lips were softer than heaven when Frank leaned forward. 

“You’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me,” Frank said when they pulled apart. And hearing those words was all that Gerard needed to kiss back with his entire being, the replying “I love you” mixed and mumbled between their lips. 

Soon they were tangled back on the bed, bodies moving and the future and fate hanging like stars above their heads. 

It was December. In a year and a half, Frank would graduate from Snyder Hill high school. In the cool June air, he’d step out of the gray school for the very last time. He’d hug Ray and break Pete’s heart one last time, then he and Gerard would leave. Together they’d live in Chicago. They would move in near Alex and Natalie and the rest of Frank’s second family. Frank’s mom would move there too, and every day Brian would call them to ask if they were paying their bills and wearing enough warm clothing. Gerard would go to art school and Frank would work in music production, and in the windy city they’d color their world with every shade of every emotion, and fate would make everything _right_ again.


End file.
